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COPYRIGHT DEPOSITS 



OPINIONS OF THE PRESS 

ON 

"MOODY MOMENTS" 



The author is blind, and this fact lends something more 
than pathetic interest to his verse, for it fiimishes the motif 
of many of his lines, and, without affectation, enables the 
reader to enter somewhat into the experience of one thus 
isolated as, for example, in the moving sonnet, "Bewitching 
Sleep," and in the verses, "Cherubs, I Follow Slowly," — The 
Atlantic Monthly. 

Mr. Doyle has a pleasing way of expressing himself in 
verse. His songs are simple, tender, and from within, for the 
most part. Here and there, however, a note of fire is struck, 
and the thrill of genuine inspiration gives momentary eleva- 
tion to the effect of his song. 

Taking his misfortune into consideration, the conclusion is 
forced at once that here is a talent of high order working its 
way through the dark, and "remembering the light." — New 
York Independent. 

Is not this man a poet? — it would be hard to deny him the 
name. The lines here and there we have italicized are in a 
high degree poetical, and the sonnets we have quoted show a 
rare appreciation of the value and use of that form of verse. 
— The Springfield Republican. 

Mr. Doyle is to be cordially congratulated upon the extra- 
ordinary vividness of his mental vision — without which the 
best of eyes, aided by a microscope for the infusoria^ and a 
telescope for the planets, remain only imimaginative re- 
porters. Among the best poems are the imaginative and 
powerful "Fire Bird," and the grave and noble sonnet 
beginning : 

"Gray, venerable shepherds, who have lost 
Vast numbers of their flock along the vale." 

Such work as this shows the author to be not incapable of 
sustained verse; his talent is genuine, nourished by his brave 
interest in the world of humanity, from which no loss of a 
sense can shut out a healthful spirit. — Boston Literary World. 



The 
Haunted Temple 

and Other Poems 



By 

Edward Doyle 

Author of " Moody Moments " 




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I wo Copws rtscuivea 

APR 19 i«0^ 

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COPY B. 



Copyright, 1905 

BY 

EDWARD DOYLE 



Contente 



PAGE 

Dedication i 

The Haunted Temple S 

Democracy 27 

The Searching Swallow . . . .30 

From the Feast I Rise Trustful . . .32 
Oft, My Babe! I Fancy So . . . .38 
The Star of the Twilight . . . .39 

Faith 44 

They Were Human Features . . -45 

The Song of the Soul 47 

Liberty Bell 48 

Harlem 50 

The Father of Our Naval Glory . . .52 
Memorial Trees on Washington Heights . 56 
The East River Prison Hulks . . 58 
Grant 60 



SONNETS 

By the Door . . . . 

Beatrice . . . 

'T Is Now Three Decades 

To A Child Reading 

A Hundred Gates of Brass 



65 
66 
67 
68 
69 



PAGE 



Wall Street 70 

Beyond . -71 

Grace 72 

The Spirit's Chant 73 

When Love It Was 74 

Yet Ever Rising Slowly 75 

The Ideal 76 

To A Child in Heaven 77 

To My Sister 78 

If 79 

Is Life All Downward Root ? ... 80 

Mental Orbits 81 

A Sunset Scene 82 

The Palisades 83 

Dame Murray of Bloomingdale . . .84 

Erin 85 

The Jews in Russia 86 

The Arch of Light 87 

Beauty 88 

The Discovery 89 

The Sun's Way 90 

Soul . . . ♦. . . . .91 

Chime, Dark Bell! 92 



*»v 



Zo m^ Mlfe 

How awful is the ceaseless roar 
Of hopes a-breaking on the shore! 

The breakers flood mine isle. 
Still, as my spirit has not flown, 
No empty shell am I to moan; 

I face the storm and smile. 

The promontory furthest out, 

I climb, and thence, at midnight, shout 

To Dawn that all is well ; 
For, howso bleak the region where 
The soul is sent, — oh! how prove there 

Not a true sentinel ? 

While watching there I see a form 
Walk on the billows through the storm 

And scale my rocky height. 
'T is Beauty's confidant and page, 
Remembrance, who, at the ocean's rage, 

Can only laugh outright. 



What is Remembrance? Oft, I ween, 
'T is Beauty — ^mother more than queen- 

Who, masked, absents her throne, 
Snatching her crown-gems, jewels rare, 
To give them to her banished heir, 

Whom she cannot disown. 

These jewels fondly I entwine 

To deck, dear Wife, that love of thine 

That swam the stormy strait, 
And that, despite the ceaseless roar 
Of hopes a-breaking on the shore, 

Smiles at my side, elate. 



Zhc Ibaunteb tTemple 



Zbc Ibaunteb ZCempIe 



The day was dark with clouds and drizzling 
rain, 
When, through the town, I took my Sab- 
bath stroll. 
The church bell sounded weirdly clear. Again, 

And yet again, I harkened, till my soul. 
Awaking from its heavy slumber spell, 

Stood, glaring, like a frozen waterfall ; 
For louder and deeper than the steeple bell, 

Than organ, choir, and anthem, sung by all. 
Was human anguish, thundering to God's 

Throne 
For justice, from the Temple's every stone. 

II 

I gazed about bewildered, for I knew 

No landmark; even the Hudson was ef- 
faced. 



The Temple, pointing to the High and True, 
Stood on an arch above a marshy waste. 

The grand surroundings held my gaze awhile. 
A hundred fountains, flashing yellow light 

On mansions, greenly groved for many a mile, 
Circled on terraces, the sacred height. 

The Temple greatened, and, as it enlarged, 

More dreadful was the thunder it discharged. 



Ill 



I shook and had no thought but how to flee 

The place of horror. Suddenly, a hand. 
Laid gently on my forehead, strengthened me 
To hear the low, sweet Voice, that bade me 
stand, 
Saying: ** Behold the Truth! make thou it 
plain. 
Speak, that the blood of brother be atoned. 
Tell those there, that they are the kin of Cain. 
Speak boldly, though with scorn thou then 
be stoned." 
' ' What voice have I ? " I gasped. ' ' Thy hate 

of wrong 
Is voice," it answered; "Truth will make it 
strong." 



IV 



I gazed up at the Fane. All arts combined 

To make it a grand Temple, saving solely 
The art of living nobly for one's kind, 

Which, drawing Grace, alone could make it 
holy. 
Upon memorial window panes were shown 

Fata Morganas, marvellous to see. 
The organ was of so profound a tone, 

It ran aground along Eternity, 
Thrilling one, as the grating of the Ark 
On Ararat, thrilled Noah, when all was dark. 



The spire was not the angel-luminous stair. 
Dreamed by the prophet, but the lifeless 
dross 
Of heart and spirit, moulded high in air. 
Nor did the Temple's frame with dome and 
cross 
Grow faster than my vision ; for I saw 

The architect and masons, each with eyes 
Turned inward, at their work, and that the 
law 



Whereby they raise their temple to the 
skies 
Was, in its course, antipodal, — not one 
With that of the ascending stars and sun. 

VI 

Tho' brief my glance, I saw, too, that each 
stone 
Was hollow, and as black as soot. Yet, 
soon, 
The temple sparkled, as tho' diamond-grown 
With rays in torrents from a sun at noon. 
This sun was soulless opulence, whose blaze 
Seemed blessings straight from God; yet, 
to my ken. 
This noon-sun that had drawn up for its rays 

The vital sparks of half my fellow-men, 
Shone ghastly on the fane, the spectral dead 
Moting most densely every beam it shed. 

VII 

**How could the Lord let such a Temple 
stand?" 
I murmured low, mistrusting my cleai 
sight. 

8 



My head grew giddy, and my wandering hand 
Groped for support. I shotild have swooned 

outright, 
But for rare fragrance, blown from vines with- 
out. 
That whitely clomb the Temple porch and 
wall. 
** Those roses," sighed the Mentor, stilling 
doubt, 
**Are child-souls, but for which the fane 
would fall ; 
'T is held up by their tendrils clinging fast 
To porch and wall, when blows the judgment 
blast." 



VIII 



Then Conscience, out-cast crone, who seemed 
to twist 
Her hands off, passed by me, with step cat- 
soft. 
And, opening the Temple portal, hissed : 
** These hands have pointed out the drear 
aloft 
Between ye and your God ; how no oasis 
Relieves yon desert sands that upward 
bum! 

9 



With eyes cast down, and set, averted faces. 

Ye barkened ; but, ye fools ! ye did not learn 
The import of my message ; for ye built 
Your Fane to God on ground not cleared of 
guilt." 

IX 

I trembled, and devoutly breathed a prayer, 
Which always drives the Evil One away; 
My Mentor fled not, but smoothed down my 
hair. 
I had no fear for what the world might say. 
But dread of uttering falsehood troubled me; 
That was abhorrent, as though I should 
change 
My human form to reptile, consciously. 

And, fanged with poison, through the world 
should range 
In ambush to way-lay the witless wight. 
Ah! saw I truly? ^"God," I cried, "Thy 
light!" 

X 

While I stood hesitant, a vivid flare 

Enveloped me. As soon as I could train 

My sight to grasp an object in the glare, 
I saw blue vapor where had been the Fane, 

lO 



And, far below, a cavern, all a-swarm 

With writhing things. A zigzag stairway, 
rent 
By lightning for the darkness of the storm 
And every foulness that, then, found no 
vent, 
Led to the pit. A look down made me reel. 
*' Descend," the voice said; " one to see must 
feel." 



XI 



Faint grew my heart ; my brow began to bum ; 
I caught some object with my drowning 
clutch. 
Hearing : * ' Man is an infant ; he can learn 

But by experience — the sense of touch. 
It is by sharing anguish, men grow brothers ; 
One mother's features, then, they see and 
know. 
If thou descend not where the cavern smothers 
Thy kindred, how conduct those down to 
woe. 
Who, truly seeing wrong, would strike it dead? 
*They know not what they do!' must still be 
said." 

II 



XII 



Down was I lowered from daylight. Oh, how 
bright 
The clouds appeared then, to my eyes 
astrain! 
Oh, for a bud for my Spring-hungry sight ! 

No echo there relinked Joy's broken chain. 
Down, down I sank. Oh, for a gulp of air. 
Cupped by the Evening's hands from out 
the sea! 
Down, down, still down! — Can this be death? 
How bear 
This dissolution, and still conscious be? 
I felt; the voice replied: ** Descend thou 

where 
The coal takes blackness from the Soul's 
despair." 



XIII 



What strata! Nor therein, as I surmised. 
Was it an ancient forest that was traced ; 

It was the modem town — ^the grove capsized 
From sunshine, bloom, bird-song, and fruit 
to taste. 

12 



It was the home with all its happy hours, 
The child as gay as the moth she cotdd not 
catch, 
The youth with eyes upon Ambition's towers, 
The housewife's smile, who e'er might lift 
the latch. 
And every face, the bloom of coast or mead — 
That had been petrified by soulless Greed. 



XIV 



Nay, it was Man, with all the links undone. 
That bound him to fair Nature. These are 
laws, 
Like those that bind the planets to the sun; 
If broken, chaos balks the great First 
Cause. 
Here, shattered was Man's sacred chain — ^the 
sight. 
The hearing, smell, the taste, the touch, the 
heart, 
The mind, and soul from what gave them 
delight. 
No longer, of Creation, formed he part, 
Developing, subliming. Ruined Man 
Here told in rock, of God's frustrated plan. 

13 



XV 



Broader and deeper grew the cavern dim. 
It was all toil, I saw, where Man must 
give 
Heart, soiil, and every gift, ennobling him. 
To the Few, more mighty, for the right to 
live ; 
Nay, must surrender, not alone himself. 

But darling child, who shyly hides his face 
Behind his open fingers, — ostrich elf! — 
Or who, with twig for sword, struts with 
grimace. 
And, dimly conscious that he leads a host, — 
Which he doth truly, — ^boldly makes his boast. 



XVI 



Yea, truly, 't is a host — his ragged heirs — 
The Race, — ^he leads, when, setting out to 
kill 
The giant, he lifts high his sword, and 
dares 
The monster to appear upon the hill. 
God! It is sad beyond all utterance 

That, when the mighty giant does appear, 
44 



No phalanx moves to check his bold advance. 
Leader and host — ^where are they? Peated 

here, 
Or turned to coal. All round, the strata 

showed 
Such armies, strewn on every upward road. 

XVII 

On them, and all, there blew a gust of rain. 
A green-eyed, bat-like monster, flapping, 
brushed 
By me and shrieked: ''Give coal a rich, red 
stain ; 
It matters not how many hearts are 
crushed." 
Then, torrents fell. Ah! whence that awful 
flood? 
Inquired my heart. "It is the children, 
wives. 
Mothers, and sisters, drained of all their 
blood — 
Emptied of joy and hope throughout their 
lives," 
Replied my Mentor. How I shook with 

dread. 
Hearing dire want, the Crusher, overhead! 

15 



XVIII 

"On!" urged the Voice. With pity for my 
kind 
For forehead lamp, I crept on hands and 
knees 
Through narrow apertures, with many a wind, 
To where I heard men moan. By slow 
degrees, 
And painful, one I reached. I gently raised 
His form of childlike weight from ofE the 
floor ; 
His heart beat, but his eyes, half shut, were 
glazed. 
Vainly I chafed his hands. Oh! how re- 
store 
A being back to hope, where air was soot? 
Lifted to walk, he*fell back, dead of foot. 



XIX 



Creeping through moaning souls, back oft I 
shrank 

From a deep precipice, between steep walls 
That o'er me shot, as high as those that bank 

The Colorado's centipede of falls. 

i6 



On leaning o'er the brink, how saw I plain 
The primal crust that, from earth's Central 
Fire, 

Held up the caverns, mansions, and the Fane. 
"What is that crust?" I queried. My de- 
sire 

Was answered quickly : ' "T is the millions 
who, 

Bom with God-power, are to themselves 
untrue." 

XX 

Rising, I caused a splash. God ! how I chilled ! 
The sound sprang up at me, a spectral 
hound 
On hunt of him by whom the blood was 
spilled; 
Then, what a pack of echoes bayed all 
round! 
Seized by a new, strange feeling that could find 

Relief but in wild laughter, thrice aloud, 
Laughed I in that dark place. God! was my 
mind 
Collapsing? In an instant I was cowed 
By a great echo mob, who, as they passed 
My laugh along, flung up their arms, aghast. 

a 

17 



XXI 

No forward step, nor back, did I dare take. 

Assimilating, then, my Mentor's arm, 
Round me swung Haughtiness, a mighty- 
snake. 
Bearing me upward. Frantic with alarm, 
My Mentor followed fast; but, as I rose. 
His voice grew faint and fainter to mine 
ear. 
Up, up I shot. Ere long, my feelings froze; 

For, as I vaulted from the cavern drear. 
The winged snake's cold blood of proud dis- 
dain 
Of man and earth, coursed also through my 
vein. 

XXII 

This flying serpent hissed the question : * * What 

Cares the Almighty for the mustard seed. 
Called beauteous earth? Space, heightening, 
sees it not. 
Its nothingness can Reason, running, read." 
I was crushed breathless. One with mighty 
hands 
Parted the glaring serpent soon from me, 
« 18 



And said, descending: ''That least seed ex- 
pands 
The greatest of the herbs — nay, grows a 
tree, 

Among whose boughs shall come and lodge the 
birds." 

I saw new meaning in the Saviour's words. 

XXIII 

Strengthened, I looked about. Above me 
flew 
Grim, bat -like Greed, — half demon and half 
brute. 
It was the monster that the mighty Few 
Had made with their own hands, to sub- 
stitute 
A loving God ; — a creature hugely made 
In their own likeness; one to whom they 
gave 
Their every breath, and whom they then 
obeyed, 
Though life with him was impulse to de- 
prave 
All human nature, and to uncreate 
The world, that he might flourish ghastly- 
great. 

19 



XXIV 

I swooned headlong. The voice said : * * Why 
He prone?" 
I labored to my feet, but fell aback, 
For down the roof crashed, as tho' tempest- 
thrown. 
Up, thro' the rift and Temple, hanging 
black. 
Then blood arose like flame throughout the 
mine. 
On high it formed a cross. Still did it rise. 
Revealing shadowy, a Form Divine 

With arms extended. Lurid grew the 
skies ; 
While, from its grave, burst Echo moaningly: 
*' What ye do to the least, ye do to Me." 



XXV 

How credit what I saw? Still, if the eye 
Shines starry, like the sunken well, be sure, 

The stars grow not like lilies, but on high 
Blaze glorious and pierce the space obscure. 

Oh, Inner Light that cannot pass away! 
Let suns collide and in one blaze consume, 



The Word enlightening the Soul shall stay. 
It was its beam, whereby, through mist, 

through gloom. 
Through rock, through earthcrust, and through 

clouds on high, 
I saw the Truth, to which I testify. 



XXVI 

Yea, did that crimson current, cruciform, 

Ascend, ascend, till all that could be seen 
Was the pierced Heart upon it, beating warm 

For every suffering soul, however mean. 
In its ascent, the current parted wide 

From sparkling founts, that, yellowing in 
hue, 
Arose like solar geysers. As I eyed 

The glamour on the mansions of the Few 
About the Temple, how my veins ran cold; 
For it was human blood, turned into gold! 



XXVII 

Upon the scene a sudden darkness fell — 
Or, was it anguish that destroyed my sight ? 

21 



A wind-rush stunned mine ears; nor could I 
tell 

The sea-like whirr was countless years in 
flight, 
Until the Temple loomed forth, inly dark. 

It was a ruin ; many a porch and wall 
Had fallen. It was like the inky arc 

O'er boreal seas, or cloud about to fall 
With devastation on the breathless vale. 
Still, when I looked again, it glowed, tho' pale. 



XXVIII 

How strange that glow! A phosphorescent 
moss 
Had overgrown the fane. Tho' cold the 
beam 
That lighted up the porches, dome and cross. 
Still I admired. I marvelled at no stream 
Of people toward the portals, as became 
So great a Temple. ** People?" said the 
Voice 
In mild rebuke ; * ' There are no people ! Blame 
The Few, who, killing men of hopes and 
joys, 

22 



Have sunk their towns in Arizonian sand. 
The White race, too, has vanished from the 
Land." 

XXIX 

I stood all tremulous. With eyes aglare 
Paced Conscience there, more piteous than 
before. 
Gowned in her long, grave-grown, dishevelled 
hair, 
This outcast from the Temple trudged 
footsore. 
Into a grave that opened in her shade, 

She flung herself. There shrank she, knees 
to chin. 
And, rocking to and fro, weird moanings 
made. 
How sleep with lidless eyes, and 'mid such 
din? 
Up leaped she soon, and, rushing toward the 

Fane, 
Sought shelter ; but she was thrust out again. 

XXX 

Such ecstacy of anguish seized the crone. 
That she grew levitant. Aloft she rose, 
23 



Tearing with both her hands, her hair, grave- 
grown. 
Her hands grew wings in working thus her 
throes. 
The Temple circled she seven times, as though 
It were a viewless mountain path she clomb ; 
Then, like the little cloud that travellers 
know 
And burrow from, she loomed above the 
dome, 
Where she enlarged to sweep, as I discerned. 
The sand oasisless, that upward burned. 



XXXI 

Oh! never was such sound as that which broke 

Above the desert. Looking up, I saw 
The Crimson Cross, and heard the Heart in- 
voke 
The Fatherhood for judgment by His law. 
Such was the sound, it shivered into dust 

The starry firmament ; whereat the dark 
Was shaken by these words: ''Lord! Thou 
art just; 
No heart-beat is so faint, but Thou dost 
hark; ^ 

24 



Yet long aloud, my blood has cried to 

Thee . . . 
My God! My God! Hast Thou forsaken 

me? . . . 



XXXII 

*'The silence of Thy Heavens is not, indeed, 

That Justice drifts across celestial space, 
A soulless carcass, with no ear to heed, 

And glaring sightless at the human race ! 
For justice lives, and reaches to the mote. 

No less than mass, sustaining one and all 
To do Thy purpose. Lucifer may gloat 

Defiance, while on earth he stays his Fall, 
And breaks Thy good to fragments sharp of 

ill; 

But he shall sink, confounded; 't is Thy will. 

XXXIII 

**Thou knowest. Lord, how for all souls I 

thirst. 

The chalice I would pass, were it Thy will, 

Is the word to any soul: 'Depart, accursed! ' 

Send unto them Thy Spirit, who work ill. 

25 



How long, how long, O Father! — oh, how 
long, 
This crucifixion by mine own — ^by each, 
Who, knowing me, yet doth his brother 
wrong!'* 
Then, in his own God-tongue, did he be- 
seech. 
It was His echo that my soul heard groan 
For justice from the Temple's every stone. 



Bemocrac? 

(Lines suggested by the Grant Monument at Riverside Park, New York City.) 

Though with each step he spHt the verdant 

earth 
To its red centre, starting bursts of flame 
That, wind-blown, made an ashen wilderness 
Of forest, field and town, Democracy 
Moved forward, smiling ; for he warmly felt 
About his brow, the halo of God's love. 
And, by its light, saw triimiph through the dark. 
Could he, the long-expected, long-desired. 
Be now engulfed? What! he to disappear 
Forever, as an island in mid-sea, 
Agleam with cascades and with fruitful groves, 
Except where, from the sky, the mountain 

swoops, 
As with the rage of hunger, and darts steep 
Upon the grazing, unsuspecting wave, — 
Sinks with its peak, its cascades and its groves. 
The laden ships at anchor in its bay, 

27 



And with the last hope of the watching crew, 
Adrift with famine, who begin anew 
To cast the dice for one another's blood; 
And leaves no trace, except the flocks of birds 
That rise in columns, like volcanic smoke, 
And scatter for the land that none can reach? 
Was thus to perish bold Democracy, 
The giant who had dashed a kingdom down 
For meddling with his soul; then, clutching 

fast 
The glaring, wild Atlantic 'mid her whelps. 
Freed not her fury from his grasp, until 
He reached the region where he walked with 

God, 
Unhampered by the whim or craft of Kings? 
Democracy, that shook the sleeping wilds 
And woke them into cities with his will ; 
Then, seized invading despotdom and hurled 
Its bleeding carcass, like a thunder-bolt. 
Back to the old world thro' the clouds of war, 
Declaring with a voice that shook from 

Heaven, 
All the ill stars foredooming men at birth: 
** In this New World shall thrive no Old World 

wrong!'* 
Democracy, to perish in the act 

28 



Of towering on a mound of myriad men 
Into the sky, and flinging from our shore, 
With his fierce, Hfted hands, and all his might, 
The storm-mouthed monster of the Despot's 

get, 
That from its lairs, the caverns in the South, 
Roamed rashly toward our mountains and 

broad plains, 
To crush beneath its soul-destroying wrath, 
Our brethren, dark of face, in multitudes 
Beyond all reckoning, except of justice 
That counts the unshed tear, and asks of Cain : 
** Where is thy brother?" though the skulking 

soul 
Be but the murmur in the smallest shell. 
Imbedded in the marl beneath the deep? 
''No," spake forth God. Transfigured and 

refreshed 
By that almighty voice. Democracy, 
Haloed of brow, drew back his giant arms 
Above him, like a bow, and, with a spring, 
Hurled forth the monster, raising soon, a jet 
From the abysmal billows into Heaven 
In such a volume, it will never cease 
To fall in sunny showers upon our land. 
And form a rainbow all around the globe. 

29 



Z\)c Searcblna Swallow 

Over meadow, hill and hollow, 
Long of sweep, or eddying, 

Scuds the twittering, purple swallow, 
Feathered, restless Soul of Spring. 

Low he skims. If oft he dips, 
'T is to rise a-gleam with dew 

From his crest to pinion tips. 
As his soul were shining through. 

Rest he never takes ; but flies 

On his search from dawn to night. 

Storms that drag down scarlet skies, 
See ahead his twinkling flight. 

Wherefore scuds the purple swallow. 
Long of sweep, or eddying. 

Over meadow, hill and hollow? 
Why not perch and fold his wing? 
30 



Finds he not on all the earth, 

Fare to satisfy his heart? 
Has he cravings, too, from birth, 

For what earth cannot impart? 

Seeks he for the seed his race 
Fed on, ere the angel flew 

Over Eden, stem of face, 
And from heaven the comet drew? 



31 



from tbe ifeaet II IRtee ^Iruetful 



On the wreck of his hope — its last remnant — 

last rafter — 
Man whirled in a vortex, with planets 

charred black. 
One dense darkness was both the Before and 

the After. 
Had Creation been merely a hurricane's 

track, 
And the sun in the welkin, the Soul in the 

world. 
Been but deserts caught up, that took fire as 

they swirled? 

II 

All the human had shrunken to one, and 
that I! 
Though a leaf had the strength of its oak, 
what avail 

32 



In a whirl that was drawing the orbs from on 

high! 
So I whirled till sucked down. Could the 

human help fail, 
When Divinity, dogged to the ultimate height, 
Must have pltmged to his death? He was 

nowhere in sight. 

Ill 

I awoke ! I awoke ! I awoke from the slumber 
Of mind, and about me were mountains 

most steep. 
Ah, what ranges the billions, whose bodies 

encumber 
This planet by day as by night with their 

sleep ! 
I awoke, and ah, where was the whirl without 

gleam? 
It remained — ^where it only could be — in my 

dream. 

IV 

On arising, my impulse was first to awaken 
The corpses about me, that mountained the 
ground ; 

33 



For what wings for the world has our trans- 
port, when shaken 
To Hfe by mute blasts from the beauty 
around, 
And we list to the lark, as ascends he afar 
On the breeze from dew-sparkle to twinkle of 
Star! 

V 

As I gathered my thoughts like a garment 
about me. 
To meet with becoming respect, One august 

Who had halted his host in the hills just with- 
out me, — 
A herald thus hailed me: ** Withhold not 
thy trust. 

What but 'Welcome,' engraven in gold, is the 
East? 

All horizons are hands that direct to a feast." 

VI 

On a mountain rose beauty, an edifice cloying 

My spirit afar with its festival glare, 
And aloud spake a voice: "All is thine for 
enjoying." 
What sculptures and paintings ! what crown- 
gems ! and where 

34 



A refreshment in phantasy's fruitfulest land, 
Like the vintages, served by the Monarch's 
own hand? 

VII 

In a chaHce of StarHght, He pours out the 

strongest 
Of cordials celestial for me, lest when I 
Turn my face toward drear death, of all deserts 

the longest, 
I faint as the whirlings of dust mount on 

high. 
What the wine? It is Harmony, — surely a 

strength 
To my mind for that desert, whatever its 

length. 

VIII 

Of His richest, old wines that refreshen my 
vigor, 
Unselfishness for an ideal sublime. 
As of saints who, in plague, or in winter's 
worse rigor. 
Relieve the afflicted, is surely the prime. 
No libation, not even from yonder blue bowl, 
Effervescent with stars, gives such strength to 
the Soul. 

35 



IX 

What a chalice of music, with lark and with 

linnet 
And robins engraven! though fleetingly 

frail 
Is the chalice of odor, what tropics are in 

it! 
What poetry, then, in a luminous grail! 
Though I drink of all meads, and, in truth, 

have my fill. 
He persists in confirming His kindliest will. 



If a hint He vouchsafe, though by figure 
obscurely, 
That over the Nebulae-resonant roof, 
There is glory for me, how requite Him so 
poorly 
As shut my soul's eyes in His face and beg 
proof? 
Nay, extending five fingers, demand that He 

must 
Put all Truth in their closure, or forfeit my 
trust! 

36 



XI 

From the feast I rise trustftil. "" I know how 
abysmal 
And mountainous, too, is the dark to tra- 
verse 

From matter to spirit; but, surely, the dismal 
Has bounds; and if clouds should be hard 
to disperse, 

*T is because, in His goodness, Gk)d wants me, 
in sooth. 

To be almost His peer by my Faith in His 
Truth. 



37 



Q% flD? Babe I II ifancB So 

Baby sleeps. How sweet her smile! 

She awakes, and still it lingers. 

Is her smile the lambent fingers 
Of the angel, who, the while, 

Strokes her cheek and loathes to go? 

Oft, my Babe ! I fancy so. 

Serious now is baby's face. 

Does her waking soul compare 

Us in shade with sprites in the glare 
That, from Heaven, through rifts of Grace, 

Falls aslant on earth below? 

Oft, my Babe! I fancy so. 



Zhc Star of tbe zrwUlgbt 



Come, star of the twilight! 't is time for thy 
coming. 
The cow for her loneliness dolefully lows. 
Astray on the wayside; no bee now is hum- 
ming, 
Except one overladen and shut in the rose ; 
While Eve, like a sightless, sad maiden, be- 
guiling 
The pain of her spirit, is beading the dew. 
With eyelids cast down, yet with cotmten- 
ance smiling. 
Because of her trust that her star will be 
true. 

II 

Thou comest, O star, in response to my yearn- 
ing! 
Aye, comest, and being of dawn — to my 
ken — 

39 



As well as of dusk, I behold in thy burn- 
ing, 
A beckoning onward forever to men. 
How Reverie, moved by thy influence, rises! 

How swiftly its current, unaided by oar, 
Bears off from the wrecks of my sanguine 
emprises. 
Reflection — my craft, made of hulks washed 
ashore! 



Ill 



Out, over the wonderful depths of forever 
Where flaring, rich golden, all glorious 
days 
Are lamp-fish a-circling, — I wander, but 
never 
For more than a moment lose sight of thy 
blaze. 
Yetlo! thou art gone! the seas search for thy 
splendor. 
Thou tumest from earth in no pallor of 
flight, 
But goest above to Jehovah, to tender 

Thy homage in secret to Him on the 
Height. 

40 



IV 

To gates that ope gray and, behind thee, 
shut golden, 
I follow. How stay with the Titans that 
loom 
Grotesque, and that grating out jargons, 
embolden 
Each other to utterance more harsh in the 
gloom. 
Until one, ascending the mountain of madness. 

Cries out to the races all over the earth : 
**Come, perish together; rid earth of her sad- 
ness!" 
As life were but travail with Horror for 
birth! 



For peace so inglorious, surely I long not, 

Whatever my anguish. Whatever reverse 
Defeats my endeavor, the Father I wrong not 
By deeming His prompting incessant, a 
ciirse. 
I know it is little that I have discerned ; 
How count, then, the Total? Before I 
became, 

41 



What truths, with their orbits round earth, 
may have burned? 
And, when I depart, what new thousands 
may flame! 



VI 



When, therefore, I ponder on Wisdom^s re- 
veaHng 
Through nature and prophet, and fancy a 
void, 
I doubt not that thither a planet is wheel- 
ing 
More fulgent than any the world has en- 
joyed. 
How question that orbs of a Roentgen-Ray 
sparkle 
Illumine all voids that the mind can con- 
ceive ? 
If not, that truths rise, as dost thou, till they 
darkle 
In glory to teach us to soar — ^to believe? 



VII 



Belief is the flight of the spirit ; and, surely, 
Wherever the Light in its fulness is stayed, 
42 



The spirit can soar where thou poisest se- 
ciirely, 
And see that the darkness is Substance's 
shade ; 
Nay, pendant with thee, it can bask on the 
far side, 
In Morning unbroken; and oh! can discern 
That Substance, though often a night without 
star-side. 
Is Love, that for atoms has vistas eterne. 



43 



Ifaltb 

Faith, a child with angel sight, 

Leads the soul through Nature's night. 

Winds are moths about her light. 

What the taper that she bears? 
Reason that, raised Heavenward, flares. 
Whence the flame? Ask stars whence theirs. 

Could the hand that lights the sun, 
Stars and planets, every one. 
Pass the soul and leave it dun? 



44 



tCbe? Wcvc Ibuman ffeaturee 

B S>ceam 

What legions! coiild an eagle 

Pass them in a whole year's flight? 
They thronged the mountains, flashing 

Like snow from every height. 
Oh, how mine eye was ravished, 

How joy streamed forth in tears, 
For theirs were human features 

I had not seen for years! 

On roads, and on steel bridges 

O'er rivers, dark and fleet, 
They marched with tread that sounded 
One hammer's regular beat ; 
Yet, tho' they forged the mountains 

A ladder to the Spheres,' 
What cared I? I saw only 

Their features thro' my tears. 

45 



O'er Winter, chained to summits, 

Adown the glad Spring flew 
In meteoric greenness 

That changed to every hue ; 
Yet oh! what was that splendor, 

Tho' trebled by clouds and meres, 
Beside those human features 

I had not seen for years ! 

Like lightning, world-wide, halting, 

How scanned I every face ! 
And, wild with dread of losing 

The eye-clasp of my race. 
How, like a dead man, wakened 

After a thousand years, 
I gloated, gloated, gloated, 

Till joy drained all my tears! 

What was the martial music, 

That drew from every coast. 
Dark forest, swamp, and desert, 

That mountain-scaling host? 
The vision of each other. 

Which stirred them, till, with cheers, 
They took at Dawn, the places. 

Held night-long by the spheres. 
46 



Zbc Song of tbe Soul 

In joyous, skyey flight 

I skim along, 
All day and through the night, 

With bursts of song. 

*'A11 through the night," said I? 

There is no night 
About me, for I fly 

From light to light. 

My shadow may be seen 

In seas of tears, 
But I soar on serene 

And lead the spheres. 

On, on I soar to learn 

That Life, in sooth. 
Is to soar on and yearn • 

For Boundless Truth. 

What, then, is Rest? Is Peace 

Pursuit for ever? 
*T is God without surcease, 

Though wholly, never. 



47 



Xlbcrt? »eU 



(Written in honor of Caesar Rodney, the Delaware delegate to the Pro- 
vincial Congress at Philadelphia, whose vote enabled the friends of Liberty 
to pass the Declaration of Independence, on Thursday, July Fourth, Seven- 
teen Hundred and Seventy-six.) 



Liberty Bell without a tongue, 
Over the Hall of Congress, swung. 
True was its metal, and wrought well ; 
Yet, as it swayed, no one could tell 
Whether it ever, or soon, would sound. 
''Find Rodney, — quick!" the cry went round. 

Far in the field, drear miles away, 

Rodney was arming for the fray. 

Learning that he, and he alone. 

Could give that bell eternal tone, 

How, through a cloud of wood and weed, 

He spurred and spurred his lightning steed! 

Liberty Bell without a tongue, 
Over the Hall of Congress, swung. 

48 



Rightward and left, it swung for hours. 
Whether the Dawn, or Midnight Powers, 
That wrestled on high, would win the bell 
For silence, or sound, no one could tell. 

Out of the cloud of wood and weed. 
Village and town, dropt Rodney's steed. 
Into the Hall the rider sprang, 
Touched the bell, and, God! it rang! 
Rang ! Rang a grand sunrise of sound, 
Awaking Man the whole world round! 



49 



Ibarlem 



(On its retreat from Long Island, the American Army was saved from 
annihilation by the gallantry of Colonel Knowlton, Major Leitch, and the 
men vmder their command, who checked the British at Harlem, September 
1 6, 1776. The Columbia University occupies the historic site.) 



Look! On Harlem's blood-drenched sod, 
Freedom kneels and pleads with God. 
Heart-split, how her arms invoke. 
Like a lightning-sundered oak! 

II 

Up she leaps with whitening rage, 
For her child, the Future Age, 
With his face hid in her skirt, 
Tugs in dread of mortal hurt. 

Ill 

Circling her, the dauntless few 
Dash and slash with sabre true. 
How their every zigzag blow 
Gleams with souls, wrenched from the foe! 
50 



IV 



Knowlton draws his hand, dyed red, 
From his breast, and waves ahead; 
Leitch cries, falHng: **0n to the foes! 
Tend to me at the battle's close." 



Look! Almighty Justice' form 
Stands against the greatening storm — 
Stands, and, sheltering the few, 
Shows His face to himian view. 



5X 



Zbc ifatber of our IRaval 6Ior? 



(During the action between the Alliance and the British ships of war, the 
Atlanta and Trepassy May 28, 1781, Commodore John Barry was so se- 
verely wounded that he was forced to leave the deck for treatment. While 
his gaping wound on the right shoulder was being dressed by the surgeon, 
the officer in charge of the Alliance came below to his commander to say 
that they were overpowered and would be annihilated, if they did not 
strike their colors. "Strike my flag? Never! " shouted Barry, and bound- 
ing up the companionway to the deck, he so inspired his men that after a 
desperate struggle of four hours, the British ships surrendered. Sir William 
Howe had offered Commodore Barry ;£2o, 000 and the command of a British 
squadron, if he would desert the cause of freedom.) 



''The foe!" a voice yelled from the mast. 

The Captain raised his glass and spied 

Two vessels. ''Give them chase," he cried. 
He cleared the deck for action fast, 
And then spake thus : ' ' Howe wanted me 

To take his squadron; I declined; 

But, seeing it, I change my mind. 
Lads, help me take it — from the sea!" 

"Hurrah! hurrah!" husked out the crew; 

And faster the Alliance flew. 
52 



II 

' * Fire, lads ! " he cried. What mainyard crash 
Echoed his cannon! Oh! how blazed 
His eyes, like battles, when, joy-crazed, 

He balked the foe's concerted dash! 

They tacked, and, smoking still, hove nigh. 
Was Fate to close those ships like shears. 
On Freedom's pennon which, 'mid cheers, 

This sailor had been first to fly? 

Urging his gunners where out-worn. 
He fell, and from the deck was borne. 



Ill 

** Surgeon," he hissed, "quick with your knot. 
How lie here while the fight goes on? 
We are a-whaling, and, anon, 

Those bulls, harpooned by our sure shot. 

Will be hauled in. Oh! 't is a catch 
That will supply the oil to light 
Freedom's dark camp for many a night!" 

How his wild eyes lit up the hatch, 
When a subaltern came, wry-faced 
From words in his mouth, not to his taste. 

53 



IV 

The man, all powder-smeared, bent low 
To the stretched Captain, as he spake : 
''We 're overpowered, and save we take 

The colors down at once. Sir " ''No! 

Aloft they stay!" bold Barry roared. 
Up leaped he from the surgeon's grip. — 
How hold the lightning? — that dead ship 

Took life from him. Both sides, it poured 
Out, crater-like, until, at last. 
The foes drew their flag from the mast. 



He manned those ships ; nor, till his men 
Veered them toward shore, felt he his wound ; 
And, when, below, the gash was botmd, 

He hastened to the deck again. 

Aloft, clouds brewed ; but these were hurled 
Asunder, and, twin-bursts, they swelled 
The seas peak-high ; yet he beheld 

A rarer sight — a rescued world! 

And knew the arch in Heaven to be 
His valor shining through the sea. 

54 



VI 

How honor him who never struck 

His Colors, but fought on, though gory, — 
The Father of our Naval Glory? 

Hast thou, Old Sea, seen grander pluck? 

Hast thou in thy memorial deep 
A purer pearl than Barry's deed? 
Search with thy million hands and knead 

The countless ages in thy keep. 
Lo ! how his soul lives in his sons 
Where e'er they sail with Freedom's guns! 



55 



flDemorlal Zvccb on TtClaaMngton Ibeffibte 

(Thirteen trees were planted by Alexander Hamilton at the Grange, 
Washington Heights, New York City, in commemoration of the States 
that took part in the Revolution. The trees have been reduced to seven 
by the storms of a hundred years.) 

Not idle is this armless band. 

They murmur not, with head to head, 
What only they can understand. 

Hush, Traffic! Here, walk soft of tread. 

Without a leafy whisper, where 

Once camped the dauntless, sorely -tried, 
They look aloft, and lo! we share 

Their vision of the glorified. 

Though Brooklyn's meadow, Harlem's Height 
And all surrounding hills were erst 

Steep stairs in Freedom's headlong flight. 
How shines on high the scene reversed! 

How, in the air of bright renown. 
Those battles all are soaring stairs 

«^6 



^^--r^-.J- 



To Freedom's feet, till, lo! a crown 

Of stars she takes from Heaven and wears. 

With mute star-tread about the throne 
Of Freedom, move with cheer benign, 

The bold Thirteen — oh. Glory's own 

Who worldward beck with wands that 
shine! 

In storm, or calm, no idle band — 
The veteran trees on yonder croft. 

Before them many an age shall stand, 
And, reverential, look aloft. 



57 



Zbc jgaet Vlvcv prteon Ibulfte 



(During the Revolution fifteen thousand American patriots perished in 
the British prison-hulks, anchored in the East River.) 



Haste in your rush, mom, noon, and night. 
Across these bridges, thoughtless throng! 
How haste, when from this stream the song 

Of freeman's scorn of brutal might — 
The paean raised to freedom, erst, 
If touched by thought, renews its burst! 

Below, the dark pest hulks were moored. 
Where thousands rotted in the hold. 
Oh! such the horrors daily doled 

To Freedom's noblest, chain-secured. 

They heard with more delight than dread, 
Each morn's salute : * ' Turn out your dead. ' ' 

Of all the huddled brave, but one 
Abjured his faith to gain the shore. 
Beast-like, they licked the hardened gore 

58 



Within the hulk-hold cold and dun, 
Rather than let a brooklet clear 
Reflect their stoop of baseness near. 

What! do ye grudge a moment's stand, 

When Fancy touches Freedom's slain? 

Hark! hear the chords of their disdain 
Of all thought but to free their land. 

What music — nay, arch-trumpet call! 

Echo, ye groves of steeples tall! 

Wake, O ye dead — ^ye who forget 
Due reverence to deeds sublime. 
'T is a dead country in quicklime 

That to the past pays not its debt. 

Halt, then, a moment, thoughtless throng, 
To hear this river's sacred song. 



59 



(5rant 

(At the obsequies of General Grant at Riverside Park the warships in the 
Hudson boomed at intervals of one minute.) 

Boom, O ye warships! boom, each minute 

boom! 
Ye voice the gratitude we fain would shout. 
Boom! for ye rouse not from the distant deep, 
The monster fratricidal war, to rear 
Its hideous head amid the Heavens, and make 
The rising, roving and insatiate sun. 
Its coldly glittering eye to search the land 
For youth and manhood at the school and 

plough. 
Boom, O ye warships! for ye rouse no more 
The creature that, with coils of chaos, wound 
About our country, crushing out her life 
In streams of gore, that, like the Deluge, left 
Not one green herb; the creature that, for 

years. 
Disported storm-like in the crimson flood 
With such wild rage, its ceaseless splashes 

drenched 

^60 



The four horizons to the furthest home. 
Yea, boom, O warships! ye make audible 
The heart-throbs of the milHons on the shore ; 
For they forget not who, at last, struck down 
The monstrous Thing and cast it in the sea; 
And, when its carcass of revenge and hate 
Rose on the waters — Oh! a ghastliness 
That, high as heaven, would have shut out the 

sun, 
And have bred pestilence from age to age — 
Who loosed it from the swamps and fissured 

rocks 
With gentle word, whereat the day and night 
Became a tempest and a tidal wave 
Against the horror, so that now it drifts 
Among the icebergs that chill not the child, 
Held in the father's arms upon the shore. 



61 



Sonnets 



63 



B? tbe Boor 

If, by the door, at crimson eve, I stand, 
'T is not to watch the clouds or sea-fowl fly, 
But listen, dearest, to thy lullaby 
Which leads otu* darling, like a loving hand, 
Down slumber's dark descent, when, zephyr- 
fann'd 
By the sweet heaven of knowing thou art 

nigh, 
Her blue eyes close, and lost becomes her 
cry 
In her red lips' glad smile in wonderland. 

Thy song is prophecy of days afar ; 

And oh, as faint and fainter falls thy note, 
Thy love appears a lark in heaven remote, 

Companioning from Eve, its peerless star. 
To Hope's red mom, that bursts all clouds 
afloat. 

Ah! how but linger at the door, ajar? 



65 



Beatrice 

Oh, while my baby sleeps, what fancies rise! 
A sparkling dew, all tremulous, she seems, 
On Sltimber's crimson - opening bud of 
dreams. 
Cease, Zepyhr! hold thy breath; nor move 

thine eyes. 
Lo! angels deem her sleep auroral skies, 
And float thereunder from the crescent's 

beams. 
Oh, God be praised that, while with woe 
earth teems, 
It is on Gideon's fleece my infant lies! 

O Beatrice! my love spreads azure-wide 
Above thy sltimber, and, star-lighted, 

reaches 
The Father whom no soul in vain beseeches. 
It craves for thee the joys that cross the tide, 
When the dark seas that roar along Life's 
beaches 
With threat of chaos, hear God and divide. 



66 



*Z l0 novo ZTbree ©ecabea 

'T is now three decades since the shores of 
light 
With their green forests, cities, peaks of 

blue. 
And wandering birds were blasted from my 
view. 
And I have been storm-tossed from blight to 

blight. 
Despair, the awful shape that looms to sight 
O'er the calm waters where, if one pursue 
His quest, he perishes with all his crew, 
Has hourly risen, and put my craft to flight. 

But now I face the monster. Let him loom 
Above me, with his lurid, gloating eyes. 
And shake the ocean's surge and clouded 
skies 
With thunderous threat of my impending 
doom. 
If triumph is the port of my emprise ; 
My Will harpoons this monster of the gloom. 



67 



Zo a CbllD IReablrtQ 

My darling! spell the words out. You may 
creep 
Across the syllables on hands and knees, 
And stumble often, yet pass me with ease 
And reach the spring upon the stimmit steep. 
Oh, I could lay me down, dear child! and 
weep 
These charr'd orbs out, but that you then 

might cease 
Your upward effort, and, with inquiries. 
Stoop down and probe my heart too deep, 
too deep! 

I thirst for knowledge. Oh, for an endless 
drink ! 
Your goblet leaks the whole way from the 

spring — 
No matter; to its rim a few drops cling, 
And these refresh me with the joy to think 
That you, my darling! have the morning's 
wing 
To cross the mountain, at whose base I sink. 



68 



a Ibunbreb (Batea of ffiraee 

Around me are a hundred gates of brass, 
At each of which I knock with heart and 

brain. 
FeeUng each gate, I make out but too plain 
The sentence: ''By this way thou canst not 

pass." 
With naked feet I walk on molten glass 
From gate to gate, and shake each bar in 

vain. 
Ah ! hearing but too well the martial strain 
Within the walls, how help but sigh ''alas!" 

I kneel, and with my finger which I char, 
I rudely sketch a meditative soul 
On the white loam, with Nature's Runic 
scroll 
In both his hands, and, over him, a star 
That sheds light on each page. No drum's 
wild roll 
Distracts me, then ; the host has marched afar. 



69 



Mall Street 

I look up, but find little to extol 

In these tall structures. They appear to 

me 
Great mausoleums ; for, in them, I see 
Men with shut eyes and without heart or soul. 
Though on each door is writ in golden scroll, 
''The way to Freedom," Greed, who holds 

the key. 
Smiles grimly ; for, the Ghoul ! no thought 
has he 
To let a mortal out from his control. 

Vainly the sun cries out: ''Help me to right 
The human ship, awry in Summer's tide ; 
Help, help me on the heart and spirit side! " 
Ah! when the men with more than morning's 
might 
To right that ship, help not, how gaze with 
pride 
On their entombment to a giddy height? 



70 



Be?onb 

The azure is a magnifying lens 

To angels o'er it, poised in ecstacy. 

A good grows grander up to where they be, 

And only good can ever reach their kens. 

A good deed, hid from us by reedy fens. 
Or river mist, lights leagues of lake and lea 
To their rapt glance ; and, oft, 't is bloom 
where we 

See only crimson trails to lions' dens. 

A magnifying lens, 't is truly; still. 
It bulkens not our selfish meannesses 
Beyond the worm's small maw, which is 
their size. 
No pageantry to Chaos, though it fill 

The whole world, but the Movement unto 

Peace, 
Reaches yon watchers through the lensing 
skies. 



71 



(Brace 

Who that knows Life — the weakness of our 
Will 
And fury of temptation — ^will exalt 
Himself above his brother, stmk in fault? 
Loose is the soil we grasp, and steep the hill. 
Oft, when most confident of strength and 
skill. 
We fall and reach the frog-pool, ere we halt. 
Hark! hear the stir of thousands, wild to 
vault! 
No soul, wherever srmk, can rest stone-still. 

Oh! how temptations flash whenever we 
Attain a foothold on a lofty rock. 
Stand and look round ! They blind us with 
their shock. 
O Grace, whose glint of wing I faintly see 
Through fog of bat-like fiends that rotind 
me mock. 
Break through, break through, and take me 
up with thee ! 



72 



Zbe Splrire (tbant 

With aspirations up the Spirit wings, 

Beating abysmal darkness toward the Light. 

Above, poise Angel hosts to watch its 
flight 
From out the whirl where downward plunge 

all things. 
Born for cerulean soaring, up it sings, 

Its carol guiding dim-eyed Dawn aright. 

Up, up it soars ; for ah ! its pinion might 
Increases with its struggles and its stings. 

Hark to its joyous chant: ''Let torrents fall; 
They cannot drown me, nor whirl me 

adrift ; 
I scud up through the lightning's zigzag 
rift 
And laugh down at the clouds that would 
appal; 
Yea, for God gives me pinions, strong and 
swift. 
To beat down storms and heed His skyward 
call." 



73 



Mben Xove it Mae 

All nature does my soul assimilate, 

For what but manna all the things that are? 
The earth, the sim, the moon, and every 
star 
Melt in my mind, and form such nourishing 

cate, 
I grow a god. Ah, then, I contemplate 
My whitherward! for clouds rise, bar on 

bar. 
Perturbed with dawn waves by the planet 
jar 
Of Infinite Power which I, perplexed, await. 

Beneath me. Nature's myriad peaks of snow 
Melt and become the freshet of an hour. 
I tremble at the roar; but do not cower! 
Oh ! what have I to fear, when well I know, 
That Love it was, who breathed me out of 

nought. 
And made me god-like with transcendent 
thought? 



74 



l?et fiver IRteing SIowI? 

My soul seems drowning fast; yet, if to-day, 
I sink down to the bottom of the deep. 
Where only grim, misshapen creatures 
creep, 

And, in its awful roar, I swoon away, 

I rise to-morrow to the Nebulae, 

Whence dazzling constellations start and 

sweep. 
Proclaiming by the orbits that they keep, 

A Master whom 't is glory to obey. 

I catch a trailing star, and, circling space. 

Behold below a Countenance Benign 

. Reflected in the billows ; then, divine 

Down in the darkest depths, the human race 
Contending with the monsters of the brine. 

Yet ever rising slowly, stirr'd by Grace. 



75 



Z\)e ll&eal 

All men were gathered by the broad, blue 
stream, 
When, from the shore, an angel flung a 

shell. 
Along the surface, how it rose and fell. 
Sun-like! It was the Truth. Its glorious 

gleam 
Some saw and followed, and, though, it 
would seem. 
They sank beneath the storm's terrific 

swell. 
The Angel smiled and said: ''Lo! they 
swim well, 
Who, though submerged, still struggle toward 
the beam." 

Buoyant with joy, the Angel followed them 
Across ten thousand night-falls of the brine. 
His crimson shadow made those waters wine. 
O happy they whom tide, nor storm, could 
stem! 
For, when, at last, they reached the shore 
divine, 
Each found the shell and got its priceless gem. 

76 



Zo a Cbllb in Ibeaven 

It is not thou who art within the tomb 

This morning, but my spirit, darling child! 

Thou art arisen; but I, not reconciled 
To thy departure, feel the damp and gloom 
Of deep inclosure from the summer's bloom, 

And the warm sim, now bright, as when he 
smiled. 

Beholding thee, a spirit undefiled. 
Pass him in Heaven from evil and its doom. 

I rise, for, from the grave, Faith rolls the 
stone ; 
And, as Time's shining arch, of which the 

years 
Are swiftly-changing rain-drops, disappears. 
And darkness skulks away to die alone. 
My grateful thoughts gush forth to God, 
like tears. 
That evil, Aubrey! thou hast never known. 



77 



Zo m? Steter 

O Sister! truly is thy other name 

Self -Sacrifice. What years thy tireless eyes 
Have borne me upward! for, if through the 
skies 
My soul has soared above the smoke and 

flame 
From earth, reduced to ash and dust, whence 
came. 
But from thy sight, my glimpse of how to 

rise? 
Whence, too, the vigor for my long em- 
prise ? 
Ah! from thy faith in me and in my aim. 

To whirl in black eruption — ^what a doom! 
Ah! if not for thine eyes that gave me 

sight 
Of azure, and thy faith that urged my 
flight. 
How could I have escaped the crater's ftime? 
I should have fallen headlong, senseless 
quite. 
And stirr'd to flame the ashen depths of 
gloom. 

78 



Hf 

Ah! if this Hfe were bounded by the tomb — 
If Love, Hope, Faith and noble deed were 

all 
Dashed back in fragments by the granite 
wall — 
If passionate longings were but forms that 

loom 
Above the field of battle lost — if doom 

Gathered all clouds for one dire thunder- 
fall. 
That would bring down the heavens and 
leave no small. 
Blue space on high for one star-seed to bloom — 

Then, I should madden at Pelee's blown 
blaze 
Turning town after town in ashen heap, 
And cry out: "God, thou nightmare of my 
sleep!" 
But, in the densest darkness, strange light 
plays 
On Life's tall mast. Whence comes that 
flame aleap, 
But from shore lights Beyond? There we 
shall praise. 

79 



16 Xlfe an Dovonwarb IRoot? 

Ah! there are times I raiss the morning's 
trail. 
Hill after hill I climb, but glean no glint. 
No steps I see, but those of nightfall's print, 
And these I follow deep, though oft I quail. 
Where wander I, forsooth? Oh, where the 
pale. 
Brief star-sparks, struck by night from 

azure's flint. 
Burn out, ere they illumine with a hint 
That life is aught but gnarled and fruitless 
bale! 

Is life all downward root? I soar blue space 
To find aloft a glimpse of bud, or bloom. 
Or waft of fragrance ; all is stifling gloom. 

About to fall headlong, I gasp, when grace, 
A breeze born by the bursting of Christ's 
tomb, 

Revives me, and I lift a trustful face. 



eo 



fIDental ©rWte 

What if bold thinkers, like great planets, 
swing 
Beyond my vision and in mirk decline ? 
Their orbits may be more immense than 
mine. 
Our mental orbits — oh, how varying! 
Some are no broader than a pasture ring ; 
While others girdle Heaven — nay, seven- 
fold, shine 
A halo round the head of God benign; 
Or trail dark nether space with bloom, like 
Spring. 

If, from the mass of mist, a star doth swerve 
And draw a cluster to the East, or West, 
Or sweep beyond, it heeds Divine behest. 
What! if an orb describe a larger curve 
Than mine can take, know I all regions 
blest 
That I should say: *'No good yon star can 
serve?" 



8i 



H Suneet Scene 

Oft, on the wall at Riverside, I lean 

And watch the clouds pass rotind their 

monarch dead, 
To take last leave, and some memorial 
shred. 
At times they burn with such prismatic sheen 
And shapes so multifarious that, I ween, 
The chaos, hurled ablaze on high, is fed 
By Time's proud Empires, thtmderous once 
of tread. 
And all forms monstrous, that have ever been. 

Oh ! could my soul behold the ruthless wrong 
Of man toward man, that, clouding earth 

and sky, 
Makes blazing Love a rayless orb on high, — 
Lift, and, transmuted golden, sweep along 
To meet the clouds, on which the Lord 
draws nigh 
With Truth triumphant, 'mid seraphic song! 



82 



Z\)c palfeabea 

Bold herd with horns flung back and startled 
gaze, 
How ye inspire my fancy! Were ye, erst. 
So thunder-stricken by the Hudson's burst 
Among you, ye are still filled with amaze? 
What! does its meteoric beauty daze 

Your sight so, ye know hunger not, nor 

thirst? 
Nor long to herd unsundered, as at first. 
And hence, stir not, nor stoop to drink, or 
graze ? 

Wild herd, ye are too sacred for the mart! 
Above you, Beauty, cap-a-pie agleam. 
Stands guard forever. How with scorn 
supreme 
She smites vile Trade that, with blind Earth- 
quake's art. 
Would drive you from Manhatta's sight and 
dream. 
And leave not of your herd, a single hart! 



83 



2)ame flDurra? of Bloomingbale 

The foe was galloping in hot pursuit 

Of Washington, when from an arbor came, 
With roses in her hand, a gentle dame, 
Who stood before the vanguard. Her salute 
Drew the gay captain from his rearing brute 
Down to her side. He said: ''In the good 

king's name," — 
His voice low, laden more with love than 
blame, — 
**Why this rash deed?" She looked up and 
stood mute. 

He caught her arm and hiss'd : ' ' Duty to-day. " 
She pinn'd a rose on him, the whole while 

chidden ; 
Then said, heart-choked: ''Good Sir! I do 
this, bidden 
By duty — to my land." He dashed away, 
But not before her countrymen, grove- 
hidden. 
Had gained the hill and formed fresh for the 
fray. 



84 



firln 

At early dawn, while yet the earth lay dark 
In slumber, with no fair or noble dream, 
The Angel, Inspiration, all agleam. 

Lowered with a grail containing Learning's 
spark. 

On thy green shore, she found such resinous 
bark, 
She made thy hill an altar, and its beam 
Lighted not only thine own lake and stream, 

But dazzled all the world from stupor stark. 

There burst a blast, at length, that whirled 
the fire 
In black and crimson colimms through the 

air. 
Where fell the blaze, up sprang a sunrise 
glare. 
Yet, tho' for ages blew the blast most dire, 

It never, Erin ! swept thy altar bare 
Of flames to Heaven; nor made them Free- 
dom's pyre. 



^be 3ew0 in IRueeia 

From town and village to a wood, stript bare, 
As they of their possessions, see them 

throng. 
Above them grows a cloud ; it moves along. 
As flee they from the circling wolf pack's 

glare. 
Is it their Brocken-Shadow of despair, 
The looming of their life of cruel wrong 
For countless ages? No; their faith is 
strong 
In their Jehovah ; that huge cloud is prayer. 

A flash of light, and black the despot lies. 
What thunder round the world! 'T is 

transport's strain 
Proclaiming loud: '*No righteous prayer is 
vain. 
No God-imploring tears are lost ; they rise 

Into a cloud, and, in the sky remain. 
Till they draw lightning from Jehovah's 
eyes." 



86 



ZTbe arcb of %\Qbt 

Across the ocean shines an arch of Light, 
An Isthmus from the Old World to the New. 
It is a stretch of peaks, hung high and true, 
That raise man to a rapt, supernal height. 
Beneath this arch, Wealth, War, all worldly 
might, 
Drift with the stin, the moon, the starry- 
blue 
And all huge hates, the clouds of blackest 
hue. 
That growl and glare back lightning in their 
flight. 

The Arch swings forward. What if lands and 
seas 

Change places? It will reach the sea's 
new lift 

Of summits, and will draw the human 
throng 
To rapt encampments in the azure's peace 

From all things less than soul, that down- 
ward drift; 

For it is Music and the poet's Song. 



87 



Beaut)? 

Beauty is Life. It is the growth agleam 

That sets the floweret and the warbler's 
wing 

Upon the march of glad, ascending Spring ; 
The growth that, while it makes the features 

beam. 
Of man and woman, and of deed and dream, 

Stirs them to move with every vernal thing ; 

For ah! the life of my rapt visioning 
Is one with all, approaching Love Supreme. 

The art that shrinks aloof from bird and 
flower 
In inspiration Godward, perisheth; 
'T is mock Creation in the mould of Death. 
What, then, is Beauty? 'T is the upward 
power. 
Aglow in man and star, blown by God*s 
breath, — 
Creation at its culminating hour. 



L 



D)- 



Zbc Diacover? 

Illumed with feast and moated far from fret, 
For ages stood the monarch's citadel. 
Ah! hardy was the host in fen and fell, 

That, tho' by famine and by plague beset, 

Lived on with no mistrust, until they met 
One night, in answer to the tocsin bell. 
And, plunging thro' the marshes, fought so 
well. 

The castle was relieved from hostile threat. 

What, then? returning home with fife and 
drum, 
The host marched round and round, and 

each, elate. 
Entered the castle, whence, precipitate. 
All fled in horror and with pale lips dtmib! 
The King had long been dust; his chair of 
state 
Had, ages gone, a catafalque become. 



89 



The sun*s way is the soul's way unto Thee, 
O Father! thou hast not made for Thine 

own, 
A dark and narrow passage to Thy Throne, 
But the broad highway. No dark pass have 

we 
To scale up, jut by jut, where we can see 
Our way but by Fear's flashes, and the 

stone 
Above us, bears, when mounted, one alone. 
Or, most, a remnant of htimanity. 

The sun's way is thro* love made manifest. 
Called Beauty. There he climbs no eremite 
For rapt aloofness, but to lift mankind; 

And, bending with wide arms of season's 
blest. 
He bears the host, simple of heart, to sight 

Of Thee, no less than those of subtle mind. 



90 



Soul 

When you see darkness roam the world around, 
Devouring every hving thing below 
And over him, the constellations' glow 

As well as tree and plant that tribe the ground, 

You gasp for breath, though sheltered from 
his bound; 
How much more I, who feel his talon's 

blow! 
Look! in his jaws he drags me to and fro, 

Or, pausing, laps my life from many a wound. 

Yet, there is that in me that baffles him — 
That heals my every gash — nay, raises me 
Beyond his teeth and talons' crunch and 
tear. 
'T is Soul that, heightening to seraphim 
With thought of God, leaves, in its ecstacy. 
The dark below to growl and sniff the air. 



91 



Cbime, Darft Belli 

My life is in deep darkness ; still, I cry 
With joy to my Creator : '' It is well! " 
Were worlds my words, what firmaments 
would tell 

My transport at the consciousness that I, 

Who was not. Am! To Be — oh, that is why 
The awful convex dark in which I dwell. 
Is tongued with joy, and chimes a temple 
bell 

Antiphonally to the choirs on high 1 

Chime cheerily, dark bell! for, were no more 
Than consciousness my gift, this were to 
know 
The Giver Good, — which sums up all the lore 

Eternity can possibly bestow. 
Chime! for thy metal is the molten ore 
Of the great stars, and marks no wreck 
below. 



92 



PR 19 19C5 



